Red Arrows, Blue Angels and F-35 Demo Team hold fly in formation above NYC

Remember, Montgomery will be home to a squadron of F35 as part of the Alabama Air National Guard, perhaps in 2023.

What I Would Ask Them

I'm retired, and no longer able to ask questions on a regular basis of candidates and politicians. But if I were still on the job...here are some questions I would ask of the candidates for Mayor:

• "For Steven Reed: some voters who say they like you 
  also say they are worried about your father's influence. 
  Name a significant issue that you and 
  your Dad seriously disagree on. And how much of a part
  will he play in you administration if you are elected?
• For David Woods & Shannon Ferrari : You both talk about 
  reducing crime, and promise to return the city to the time when 
  Montgomery people felt safe. 
  When specifically was that? What years? Ferrari
  is nostalgic for the days of Emory Folmar, who roamed
  the city in a police radio equipped car and a .38 pistol. Is
  that a good solution to reducing crime in 2020?
  David Woods proposes police precients in all parts of the city to
  improve response time. Mr. Woods, Is there now some problem
  with how long it takes for police to respond? Stats
  please.
• For Elton Dean: It has been suggested that you 
  aren't really trying to be elected. No? 
  
  For Ed Crowell: When a military general gives an order,
  the officers below him or her jump to it immediately.
  What makes you think the civil service employees you
  would "command" as mayor would jump to it? 
  

  

  
  The election in on Tuesday. Here's the info
  I posted one month before the election.
  It includes info on where and when.

TRUST "Internet News"??????

 

In U.S., 40% Trust Internet News Accuracy, Up 15 Points

Here's the Gallup Report.

Tim says: 
First of all, define Internet News. 
If it's a trustworthy source, of course.
If it's not, of course not!

If I go to a FOX News report, I know it will be slanted.
If I go elsewhere...not s much.

Here's what Gallup found:

 

Legal Marijuana One Step Away From Alabama in 2020*

"Medical marijuana was approved by Florida voters in 2016 — with 71% of the vote! — and in March, DeSantis signed a bill allowing patients to purchase smokable marijuana for their medical needs. The younger guard, such as U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, tend to lean pro-legalization. And the state of Florida’s only Democratic official, Agricultural Commissioner Nikki Fried, got there on a pro-legalization platform.

Now, Floridians may be considering full legalization on the 2020 ballot. A group called Regulate Florida have a potential pro-legalization referendum ready for judicial review… all they need now is the signatures."

                                                                              Yahoo News STORY.

*One step, as in literally one-step, across the Alabama Gulf Coast line into the Florida Gulf Coast.

Alabama The Leader (NOT) for Women's Equality

     You might think a state with a female Governor would be in the top ten...or at least the top 25...when it comes to Women's Equality.

But Alabama---with Governor Kay Ivey---ranks 44th, according to a new study. 

• Utah* ranks last.

• Maine ranks first.

• Seven of the bottom ten are in the Deep South.

Ivey signs the abortion Ban. She did so in private.

•  Alabama also has the third lowest number of female members of state legislatures (15.7%), behind only Mississippi and West Virginia. 
• The reason there is a female Governor is the former male governor, Republican Robert Bentley, had an affair and was thrown out of office. Ivey was Lt. Governor and ascended to the top office. As Governor, she signed into law the harshest abortion ban in the U.S. behind closed doors, not taking questions.

*The Mormons just banned members from drinking green tea too. (Here's an article that goes into great depth about what LDS members can not consume.)

Tim is on Mars.

At least Tim's name is there, engraved on a microchip. My name is one of...

"826,923 names submitted through NASA's "Send Your Name to Mars" project. The chip was installed on InSight's deck. NASA used an electron beam machine at the Jet Propulsion Lab to fit all the names onto the dime-size chip."

I'm expecting a visit from Martians anytime now.

Police Union: Cops used the "least bad" option.

     About the white police in Galveston, Texas, who led a roped black prisoner down the street as they rode ahead on horseback.

Geoff Gainer, the president of the Galveston Municipal Police Association, said in a statement that officers “are expected to choose the least bad option and follow best practice and department guidelines, and these officers did exactly that.” (from the NY Times story)

     Are these Galveston cops so stupid they could not understand the image they were creating, and realize it would be explosive in 2019?

Let's see. What would have been an even "badder" option for them?

• Shoot the prisoner to death first, then call a hearse?
• Tie the prisoner's legs and drag him along behind them?
• Put a noose on him and semi-hang him from a tree till they could come back later with a vehicle?

TGFT. 

     The Democratic National Committee meets in California this week. Will Alabama be on the agenda?

     The national party may consider what to do about the Alabama Democrats, who blew past last Saturday's DNC deadline to hold elections for the Chair and Vice Chair positions (currently held by Nancy Worley and Joe Reed.).

Fireball spotted over North Alabama Last Night

This week's forecast for Montgomery is an easy one.

A 50% Chance for rain...

EVERY DAY & EVERY NIGHT!


Monday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after 8am. Mostly sunny, with a high near 98. Heat index values as high as 105. Calm wind becoming east around 5 mph in the afternoon.

Monday Night

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly cloudy, with a low around 74. South wind around 5 mph becoming calm.

Tuesday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 94. Calm wind becoming southeast around 5 mph in the afternoon.

Tuesday Night

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly cloudy, with a low around 74.

Wednesday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 94.

Wednesday Night

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 74.

Thursday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly sunny, with a high near 94.

Thursday Night

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 74.

Friday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 93.

Friday Night

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 74.

Saturday

A 50 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 92.

(NWS forecast)

And the rain is good news, since the area has been slipping into drought conditions:

 UPDATE: Apparently the NWS erred. It has changed the forecast, reducing the chances for rain in the evening to 30%.

Your Federal Taxes at work in Alabama.

Yet despite all of that spending, Alabama isn't in the top ten of states for personnel or dollars.
HERE'S the full report.

USA Today Opinion Column: SPLC is NOT an "arbiter of justice".

    The writer works for the Family Research Council....she repeats a familiar story of a crazy person who attacked their offices in 2007......deciding the Montgomery based Southern Poverty Law Center "nearly caused me to be murdered"

"The SPLC, as an institution, has thoroughly disqualified itself as an arbiter of justice. But this country would be a better place if the center’s donors, lawyers and friends would truly believe and apply Dr. King’s legacy — his peaceful pursuit of justice and his love of neighbor."

The USA Today story is HERE.

The SLPC's website has labeled the Council a hate group, and posted samples of that group's writings.

You're paying for it, but Shhhhhhh.

Alabama Won’t Release Contract Related to Executions

Posted: Aug 17, 2019 6:15 PM CDT

by Alabama News Network Staff

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) – The Alabama attorney general’s office says it will not release to the news media a copy of a contract related to death penalty litigation.
The attorney general’s office on Tuesday cited security reasons for refusing a records request from The Associated Press for a copy of a $25,000 contract with a Tennessee firm specializing in occupational safety. The state office declined to answer questions about the contract.
State Sen. Greg Albritton said the attorney general’s office indicated the contract was related to litigation over nitrogen gas as an execution method.
The state has authorized nitrogen hypoxia as an execution method but has not used it.
A federal judge last year ruled Alabama must release its lethal injection protocol but can keep some information secret, such as employee names.
(Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

It is amazing that legislators who pledge open government do the direct opposite when it suits them. 

Alabama Democratic Party Apparently Ignored Deadline.

     Saturday was the deadline for the Alabama Democratic Party to hold new elections for state Party Chair...but so far as I can tell there was no action from the party.

     Next stop may be the DNC throwing out the old election results, kicking Nancy Worley and Joe Reed to the curb. If so, that action comes just as Reed's son Steven is a candidate for Montgomery Mayor, a  non-partisan election on August 27th. 

The Struggle Over Charters Continues.

  
   You wouldn't know it from much of the local news coverage, but charter schools are still controversial. 
     The first one in Montgomery---Lead Academy--- opens on Monday, with a former Montgomery School Board president at the helm. 
     Meanwhile the Montgomery Advertiser reported the new county Board of Education voted not to provide food services to the school....a 4-7 decision that the state board overturned. 
     That's ironic. 
     Normally, Alabamians cheer for local control and local decisions...but the Montgomery System was in such bad shape that the state took control in 2017 and now can, and does, overturn decisions.
     The board's vote against providing the service is another indication of the bad blood between some members of the public school board and the charters, which will bleed money away from the already underfunded Montgomery schools.
     Outgoing Mayor Todd Strange has described the newly elected board as a "failure" because of the opposition to charter schools.
     There is no shortage of private "academies" to serve the county. Many of them started as "segregation academies" after the Brown vs The Board of Education decision opened the public schools to black students.
   

 

TGFA # 504,008

Four black teenagers were going door to door early this month, looking to raise money for their high school football team in Wynne, Arkansas. When they approached the home of Jerri Kelly, she held them on the ground at gunpoint until police arrived. 
Kelly, who is married to a county jail administrator, was arrested and charged with four accounts of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and endangering the welfare of a minor, Wynne County police told CBS News Friday.

FULL STORY is HERE

What is ASU Hiding?

    Alabama State University officials held a news conference this morning to talk about a shooting at the edge of campus yesterday that left two young men dead, one of them a student. But they refused to take questions.

Alabama News Network @ALNewsNetwork

The news conference has ended. Officials did not take public questions after. 

    When someone schedules a "news conference" but takes no questions, what they held was in fact a "news statement". 

     It allowed the university officials to say repeatedly that the shooting did not happen on campus and not much more.

     If you are not going to answer questions, just issue a statement and be done with it.

     So what is the crime rate on the ASU campus?

     One online rating of Alabama colleges and universities grades ASU with an overall C- and for safety...a B-.

Newsweek: One Less Jefferson Davis

Photo by By Sarah Stierch

His name has been removed from an arch at a fort where slaves were first brought to the U.S.

"Davis is part of one atrocious chapter of the history of the United States. His name and image no longer belong in the public space. As the country commemorates the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in Fort Monroe, it is not too late to start reckoning with the painful past of slavery and its legacies of racism and white supremacy."

See the full opinion column HERE.
 

Alabama Vs Texas. But It's Not Football

Politco reports:

Members of Congress from Texas are taking NASA to task over its reported plans to locate the majority of the work for the new moon program in Huntsville, Ala., instead of Houston, where the Apollo program of the 1960s and 1970s was anchored.

No immediate comment from the Alabama Congressional delegation.

Brutal U.S Capitalism's Roots are In Slavery

A photograph taken at a medical examination of a man known as Gordon, who escaped from Mississippi and made his way to a Union Army encampment in Baton Rouge, La., in 1863. McPherson & Oliver, via the Library of Congress

"Those searching for reasons the American economy is uniquely severe and unbridled have found answers in many places (religion, politics, culture). But recently, historians have pointed persuasively to the gnatty fields of Georgia and Alabama, to the cotton houses and slave auction blocks, as the birthplace of America’s low-road approach to capitalism."

"An 1829 first-person account from Alabama recorded an overseer’s shoving the faces of women he thought had picked too slow into their cotton baskets and opening up their backs. To the historian Edward Baptist, before the Civil War, Americans “lived in an economy whose bottom gear was torture.”

                                                                                        From an article in Today's N.Y. Times